THE INCREDIBLES:
WHEN ORDINARY PEOPLE TRUST AN EXTRAORDINARY GOD
BRAD KELLUM
SEPTEMBER 21, 2008
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“By faith Noah, after being warned about what was not yet seen, in reverence built an ark to deliver his family. By this he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.” – Hebrews 11:7 (CSB)
• SHOW NOAH VIDEO WITH CHRIS SEAY
Why did God tell Noah to build an ark?
I want you to notice THE SITUATION that caused God to come to Noah in the first place.
“When the LORD saw that man’s wickedness was widespread on the earth and that every scheme his mind thought of was nothing but evil all the time, the LORD regretted that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. Then the LORD said ‘I will wipe off the face of the earth: man, whom I created, together with the animals, creatures that crawl, and birds of the sky—for I regret that I made them’. Noah, however, found favor in the eyes of the LORD.” – Genesis 6:5-8 (CSB)
What kind of sins could these human beings have been doing that grieved God’s heart so much?
They were murdering each other. Raping each other. Stealing from each other. Lying to each other. Spreading lies about each other.
There was a kind of anarchy that had spread on the earth.
Every man for himself. And that’s exactly how people lived: For themselves. No thought for God. No thought for their fellow man. No thought for the good of others.
Greed, selfishness, murder and lust ruled every human heart.
And God looked down and said, “Look what you’re doing to each other. Look how you’re mistreating your fellow man. This can’t go on.”
TIME OUT. Let me ask you: If you had been God, what would you have done?
Have you ever found yourself in a really bad situation, I mean really negative, where things have gone seriously wrong, you ever found yourself in that kind of situation and wished you could start over?
Have you ever been involved in a relationship with someone and it wasn’t going well and you wished, “I wish we could just start over again.”
I’m not sure how it got to this point, but wouldn’t it be nice to start over.
Could we try this again? Could we start over?
I think God was at that place in this story.
This passage says that God was in pain. God was in a lot of pain over the anarchy and rebellion that mankind was spreading.
It’s the kind of pain a parent feels when their child grows up and turns out not to be such a good person.
That’s painful. To see someone you love taking a wrong path, destroying their life and the lives of others.
That is a pain that only a parent can know.
And this is how God felt. He was hurting over the fact that people were making such bad choices, destroying their lives and each other’s lives.
Now, it’s at this point that the story takes a twist because God does something unexpected.
Instead of trying to rehabilitate all of these humans He makes the decision to end their suffering.
Instead of allowing these humans to continue hurting themselves and each other, which if left to themselves they would have continued doing God decides to end their lives and thus their ability to sin which was creating their suffering.
And the way He decides to do this is by sending a massive world-wide flood.
If God destroys all human life then what will the future look like?
God decides that He will save one human and his family and start over with them.
Enter Noah: The incredible animal whisperer.
God decides to save Noah and his family and annihilate the rest of the human race.
What do you think about that? That God saved Noah and his family but destroyed other people and their families.
God dealt with Noah in a much different way than He dealt with other people.
Is that okay with you? That God deals with people differently?
I mean, some people God decides to heal them from cancer. And other people He doesn’t.
Some people God decides to use them greatly and other people God decides to use them sparingly.
How do you feel about that?
Does it bother you that God deals differently with some people than He does with others?
Does God not have the right to do with His creation what He wills?
Paul asked the question this way in Romans 9:21 (CSB): “Or has the potter no right over his clay, to make from the same lump one piece of pottery for honor and another for dishonor?”
Does not the owner have the right to do what he wishes with his property?
God’s ways are sometimes mysterious to us. I don’t pretend to understand why God does what He does all the time.
God has His reasons. And He doesn’t always tell me what those are.
And when that happens I’m left to make my own decision.
And that is: To either trust God or Mistrust God.
Some of you are suffering this morning and you’re looking around at other people wondering, “God why do you let them off so easy yet you give me all the hard stuff?”
If you are there this morning then may I ask you to look at Noah.
Noah was wondering, “Why me? Why me, God? Why are you letting me live but not all of these other people?”
But Noah did what we need to do.
1. BELIEVE IT EVEN THOUGH I DON’T LIKE IT.
This is what Noah did. He had faith even though he didn’t understand it all and probably didn’t like it all either.
God comes to Noah to explain his decision and tells Noah to get busy building a boat.
I’m sure Noah didn’t like hearing that his neighbors were going to die.
I’m confident that Noah didn’t like hearing that people he knew were going to be dying soon.
Maybe he felt a little guilty that he was being saved instead of others.
But that wasn’t Noah’s decision to make. That was God’s call.
Noah’s part was to hear God’s message and take what God said seriously.
And that’s what Noah did. He listened to God’s Word and He took what God said seriously.
He may not have enjoyed hearing it, but in his heart He took it to be the truth and he adjusted his life to it.
He got busy building a boat in obedient faith to God’s Word.
You and I may not always understand why God chooses to work differently in other people’s lives, but in the end our job is not to judge God but to obey Him.
TO BELIEVE WHAT HE SAYS EVEN WHEN WE DON’T LIKE IT.
We’ve been in this series and we’ve been looking at people from Hebrews 11, which is a long list of heroes of the faith; people who had great faith in a great God.
What’s interesting is that at the beginning of the list you see God doing amazing miracles for all of these people.
God took Enoch straight to heaven without him having to go through death.
God sent a world-wide flood for Noah and saved his family.
God gave Abraham and Sara a baby even though Abraham was 100 years old and Sara was 90.
God parted the red sea for Moses.
But then you get toward the end of the chapter, the middle of verse 35 and the list stops reading miracles and starts reading like this:
“…Some men were tortured, not accepting release, so that they might gain a better resurrection, and others experienced mocking and scourging, as well as bonds and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawed in two, they died by the sword, they wandered about in sheepskins, in goatskins, destitute, afflicted, and mistreated. The world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts, mountains, caves, and holes in the ground. All these were approved through their faith…” – Hebrews 11:35b-39a (CSB)
What happened to all the miracles? All of a sudden the list changes and you see people dying for their faith, being tortured and hurt.
Here’s the point: Just because God didn’t do miracles for these people doesn’t mean their faith was any less pleasing to God.
You don’t have to have the miracle happen to you for you to be considered a man or woman of faith.
God deals differently with people. Some people he parts the red sea for. Other people he allows to be tortured and imprisoned.
Who are we to judge God’s fairness? We are the creation. He is the creator. God has the right to do what He wills with his people.
And faith means we…BELIEVE IT EVEN WHEN WE DON’T LIKE IT.
We learn to trust God’s character and leave our lives in His capable hands.
Now, you say, “Believe what?” I said “Believe it”. But what is the ‘it’ I’m talking about?
Well, the ‘it’ I’m referring to is what God says.
The ‘it’ is God’s Word.
The reason Noah got busy building a boat in the first place is because God said something to him.
God came to Noah and spoke to him. God gave Noah a word.
Notice what the writer of Hebrews says:
“By faith Noah, after being warned about what was not yet seen, in reverence built an ark to deliver his family.” – Hebrews 11:7a-b
The reason Noah built was because God had said something to him.
Actually the Bible says God’s word to Noah had come in the form of a warning.
“Then God said to Noah, ‘I have decided to put an end to all flesh, for the earth is filled with violence because of them; therefore I am going to destroy them along with the earth. Make yourself an ark…” – Genesis 6:13-14a (CSB)
Circle the words “Then God said”. Faith is believing what God says. If God had not said something to Noah in the first place, we would not be talking about him this morning.
If God doesn’t say anything, then there’s nothing to believe. But when God does speak, then we must choose whether to take it seriously or blow it off.
Faith is believing what God says even when you don’t like it.
Faith is also believing what God says even when you don’t see it.
2. BELIEVE IT EVEN THOUGH I DON’T SEE IT.
Just ask Noah.
The writer of Hebrews says Noah was warned about what was not yet seen.
What was it that was not yet seen?
Well, for starters: rain. Up until this point in the young history of the earth it had not rained yet on the earth.
“These are the records of the heaven and the earth, concerning their creation at the time that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens. No shrub of the field had yet grown on the land, and no plant of the field had yet sprouted, for the LORD God had not made it rain on the land…But water would come out of the ground and water the entire surface of the land.” – Genesis 2:4, 5a-c, 6 (CSB)
Since God had never sent rain, Noah had never seen rain.
He didn’t know what it looked like.
So imagine Noah’s predicament when God comes to him and basically says, “I’m going to use something you’ve never seen in a way you can’t even imagine to destroy all you’ve ever known.”
That’s a hard sell. What do you think?
Noah had to choose to believe what he had never seen with his own eyes.
HOW UNSCIENTIFIC OF NOAH.
You know as people living in the modern world of the 21st century, we are basically conditioned to believe what we can see and to doubt what we can’t see.
I remember learning something called the scientific method in school.
Remember that? Where you take a problem, pose a theory, do an experiment and then observe the results to arrive at a conclusion.
Well, that method assumes you and I can see with our eyes what we’re testing.
But not all of life is like that. For example. The wind. The wind is not something I can see. I see its effects. I see what the wind can do. But I don’t see the wind itself.
Or take love. I see what love can do. I see love in action. But I don’t see love itself because love isn’t a material substance.
Love itself is invisible. Like our emotions. I can’t see my feelings. I feel them. I know they’re there. But I can’t take out my sadness and put it on a table for you to look at.
Are there times in our lives when God asks us to believe in what we cannot see?
Yes. Like Noah. Noah hadn’t seen rain. But God expected Noah to believe what he was telling him about it.
That is was real. It was coming. And it was going to flood the earth.
And God expected Noah to believe that, act on it and build that ark.
Many times God asks us to BELIEVE IT EVEN THOUGH WE DON’T SEE IT.
That’s faith.
How do you do that? How do you believe what you can’t see?
You do it ONE FACT AT A TIME.
You take one fact at a time and you build a set of stairs with it that you can walk up.
Fact #1: God has spoken to me.
Fact #2: God says rain is coming.
Fact #3: I don’t know about rain.
Fact #4: I do know God.
Fact #5: God never lies.
Fact #6: God is strong enough to flood the earth if he decides to.
Fact #7: God loves me and wants to save my family.
Fact #8: I will believe God and build the ark.
That’s how you and I walk by faith and not by sight. We walk up those stairs, right up to heaven, one fact at a time.
Until we arrive in God’s presence having believed our way there.
Well, Noah did believe it even though he couldn’t see it.
And you know the rest of the story.
The earth flooded. Everybody died, except those in the ark.
When it was all over and the land became dry again.
God did something very special for Noah and his family.
It’s my last point this morning.
I love this last point. For my first two points today I’ve been talking to you about God’s justice and power.
But now I want to talk with you about God’s love.
It’s summed up in a five letter word called grace.
Pastor Brent started a teaching series on the subject of grace with the teenagers.
Pastor Brent recently gave me this definition of grace:
Grace is getting what you don’t deserve.
Mercy is not getting what you deserve but grace is getting what you deserve.
If a police officer stopped one of us for speeding. And he said, “Even though you were going 70 in a 55 mile an hour zone, I’m going to reduce this ticket to a 60 in a 55. I’m not going to give you what you deserve.”
THAT’S MERCY. EVEN THOUGH YOU DESERVED TO GET TICKET FOR A 70 IN A 55, HE DIDN’T GIVE YOU WHAT YOU DESERVED. HE GAVE YOU MERCY.
He hands you the ticket and walks back to his squad car. But as he reaches his car he suddenly has a second thought.
He comes back and says, “Let me see that ticket. I know this is your first offense. And so even though you don’t deserve it, I’m going to give you an early Christmas present.”
And right there in front of you he begins to tear up that ticket.
THAT’S GRACE. WHEN SOMEONE GIVES YOU WHAT YOU DON’T DESERVE, THAT’S GRACE.
As I look at Noah. And I see this man and the amazing thing God did in his life, I had a moment of doubt when I said to God “Lord, if I had been in Noah’s shoes, I don’t think I would have had his faith.”
I’m not so sure I would have obeyed as readily or been as willing to believe what you were telling me about rain.
And in my mind I started to put Noah up on this pedestal. As if Noah really was superhuman and me just a regular old Joe-Christian muddling along in my life of faith.
And as I was down on myself it’s as if later God said, “But Brad, you haven’t read the end of the story. There’s a part of the story you need to read.”
And I turned to this passage in Genesis 9:20-29 (CSB):
20 Noah, a man of the soil, was the first to plant a vineyard. 21 He drank some of the wine, became drunk, and uncovered himself inside his tent. 22 Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father naked and told his two brothers outside. 23 Then Shem and Japheth took a cloak and placed it over both their shoulders, and walking backwards, they covered their father’s nakedness. Their faces were turned away, and they did not see their father naked.
24 When Noah awoke from his drinking and learned what his youngest son had done to him, 25 he said: Canaan will be cursed. He will be the lowest of slaves to his brothers.
26 He also said:
Praise the LORD, the God of Shem;
Canaan will be his slave.
27 God will extend Japheth;
he will dwell in the tents of Shem;
Canaan will be his slave.
28 Now Noah lived 350 years after the flood. 29 So Noah’s life lasted 950 years; then he died.
Right after Noah has this miraculous spiritual victory in his life, God has saved him and his family, he goes and does what some people in this room have done before: HE GETS DRUNK.
And then when he gets drunk, he does something stupid, takes off his clothes and passes out on the floor.
His son Ham walks in on him, sees his father lying naked on the floor and rather than helping him into the bed and covering him up, he decides to make a joke at his dad’s expense.
If you saw your father or mother lying in that condition, what would be your instinct?
I know for me it would be to cover them up immediately.
To cover up their shame so they wouldn’t be embarrassed.
But not Ham. But Ham went and said, “Hey Shem, Japheth, come here. You gotta see this. Dad’s totally naked passed out in the floor.”
If Ham was alive today, he would have taken a video and posted it on YouTube.
That’s how disrespectful Ham was to his father.
Naturally Noah wakes up and is angry.
But here’s the real point I want to make right now.
God saved Noah and his family. God made a covenant with Noah. God showed great respect to Noah.
And yet, when you read this part of Noah’s life, you realize Noah didn’t deserve it.
Noah was every bit as ordinary and sinful as we are.
He didn’t deserve it, yet we read verses like:
“Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD.”
“Noah was a righteous man”.
“Noah walked with God.”
“God remembered Noah”.
Noah didn’t deserve any of that. Yet God did it anyway.
And this is my final point this morning.
Faith means I…
3. BELIEVE IT EVEN THOUGH I DON’T DESERVE IT.
Some people have a hard time with this one.
They think, “I’ve done so many bad things. How could God really forgive me?”
They tell themselves, “I don’t deserve for God to love me. I don’t think God could ever really love me. I’m damaged goods. I’m dirty. I’m not worthy to be loved.”
The truth is…some of you feel this way this morning.
And I believe God sent you here today so I could tell you you’re wrong. You’re dead wrong.
God does love you. And yes, you don’t deserve that.
“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” – Romans 3:23 (CSB)
All of us have sinned. None of us deserves God’s devotion or love.
But God gives it anyway. Because of His grace. He gives us what we don’t deserve.
